ROOST REPORT 7/11 thru 7/14

This entry was sent to me by a visitor to the roost, with photos. Beautiful morning shots of the birds leaving the roost in early light...The description is wonderful, and true that the birds take a very long time to leave in the mornings, which is why 75% of the dead birds we have found in the past have been killed in the early morning hours, by an average of just 22 vehicles! Please take care morning drivers!

Thank you to Richard Senn for the beautiful photos and roost report:

START REPORT:

I'd been out on the evening of the 11th with

my girlfriend, but didn't get any pictures I really

liked. That was a really good time though as there
were 12-15 people out there just for the martins.

Everyone was friendly and the old hands met the

first timers with great enthusiasm in sharing this
event and how good it has been over the last few

days.

We came back the morning of the 12th to try again.

That morning we had clouds with intermittent showers,

so pictures were not really an option. The ones I have

sent you were taken on the morning of the 14th. It was

a clear morning with the only clouds being far out to the

east, which worked well so I wasn't shooting directly into

the sun, but there was a lot more indirect
illumination early on.

I expected all the birds to take to the sky within minutes

of each other, so I was really amazed by the length of

time that the flock spends coming and going. I noticed

the first birds in the sky a little after 4:00 am and most
all had left their roost by 6:30 am. I imagine rainy or

dark overcast days make it longer too as opposed to

clear ones.

I'm really glad that this goes on over such a long

period of time as I plan on keeping an eye on the

weather to find the perfect conditions to improve
the pictures I have. I would love to do one of the

cruises. In fact we had inquired about the cruises

this particular weekend, but it didn't work out.
We'll keep these in mind as we go further into the

season and hope that it all works out.

Credit: Richard Senn